I don’t think I can avoid it. Lileks noted this morning, on The Buzz, that today is the anniversary of the discovery of the Kensington Runestone in 1898. If anything comes within the parameters of my “beat,” I guess it would be the Runestone.

But I don’t really want to. It’s a subject that can make me no friends.

If you don’t know anything about the stone (which means you’ve never read my novel Wolf Time, and shame on you), it’s a piece of blackish stone, about a yard high (I’ve seen it in Alexandria, Minnesota, several times, and I also drove out to the discovery site once), carved with runes, an alphabet that began among the Germanic peoples in antiquity, flourished in the Viking Age, and actually survived in remote parts of Scandinavia into the 18th Century (if I remember correctly).

It tells the story of a Gothic (Swedish) and Norwegian expedition to America in the 14th Century, and notes that some of the men went out fishing, and came back to camp to find ten of their company “red with blood and dead.”

The stone was found by a Swedish immigrant farmer named Olof Ohman. He exhibited it at the local bank, and it attracted attention from a few American scholars, who rejected it as a fraud. At that point, it seems that Ohman dropped the subject (as well as the stone), turning it over on its face to serve as a step into his cattle barn. In 1907 he sold it for ten bucks to a Norwegian-American student named Hjalmar Holand, and then things started happening.

Holand became a prominent ethnic historian and a major booster of Scandinavian culture in America. For a man like Holand, the runestone constituted proof positive that Scandinavians were not Johnny-come-latelies in this country, but the original discoverers (it was much the same impulse that made Columbus so important to Italian immigrants around the same time). Holand wrote several books about the stone, and was a tireless advocate for its authenticity for the rest of his life.

Scandinavian runologists have pretty consistently rejected the stone as a hoax, and I don’t believe that opinion has changed with time. The argument about the “idiosyncratic” runes included in the inscription goes on to this day, and it goes on at a level far above my head.

A new wrinkle in the argument involves a geological analysis of the stone published in 2000. The author, Scott F. Wolter, is a highly regarded forensic geologist, who has testified as an expert in a number of legal cases. He believes that the inscribed stone was buried in the ground no less than fifty years, which would mean it had to have been carved well before Ohman’s time, and probably before there was white settlement in the neighborhood. Like every other opinion about the stone, Wolter’s has been challenged.

What do I think about the Kensington Runestone? I’ve learned to be cautious when expressing my opinion. I once told a group I spoke to in Moorhead, Minnesota that I didn’t believe in it, and the chairman, who had been very nice to me, replied with some disappointment that his grandfather had been a friend of Ohman’s.

I think Ohman (probably with the help of a friend; there was a deathbed confession by a neighbor who said he was part of the prank) carved the stone with the help of a history book he owned. I don’t think he intended to perpetrate a hoax. I think he was just interested in seeing how people would react (it has been noted by more than one scholar that Ohman never made any serious effort to make money off the thing). Then when it didn’t draw much attention, he set it aside. I think he was surprised by the notoriety that came from Holand’s books, and was afraid at that point to admit he had carved it, concerned he’d be called a liar and a hoaxter. I think the whole thing got out of hand for him, and he didn’t know what to do.

On the other hand, I’ve never seen a strong refutation of the geological analysis.

So my vote is no, but I reserve the right to change my mind.

Next question.

I can’t believe it. My side won in the school tax referendum. It seems like a very long time since I voted on the winning side in anything (although it’s not really that long. On the other hand, this is Minnesota, sometimes known as California Northeast).

Now comes the really ugly part—the part where the educational establishment takes its revenge. We know what they’ll do. They’ll do what all hostage-takers do. They’ll say, “We told you not to call the cops, but you had to go and call the cops. Now we’ll have to cut one of the kid’s ears off. We don’t want to cut his ear off. It breaks our hearts, frankly. But you’ve made the choice. It’s out of our hands. You forced us to do this.”

I’m not feeling terribly well tonight. I think I may have a cold. Or perhaps I’m coming down with the flu. I never get flu shots. I prefer the thrill of danger. And let’s face it, even the worst case consequence isn’t that bad. I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m not really very well gifted for this living business. I’d probably employ my time better in some other form of activity.



News From Norway: According to the November issue of Viking Magazine, the publication of the Sons of Norway, McDonald’s of Norway added a new menu item last August. It’s called the McSalmon, and is a fish filet wrap available “in honey and wasabi” (what the heck is “wasabi?”). At the present time it’s only available in God’s Country, but it may go global if it’s a success.



Here’s an idea I came up with today for a bumper sticker. I give it to you at no charge:



“IF YOU’RE NOT PART OF THE SOLUTION, YOU’RE PROBABLY MINDING YOUR OWN BUSINESS. THANKS FOR THAT.”

Sherwood Forest is now 450 acres, down from 100,000, and come Britons are concerned, saying the forest is one of England’s essential features. Only 450 ancient oaks are still alive. I wonder what that ancient shepherd of trees, Treebeard, would say about this.

“To wake the sleepers high and low,

And rouse them to the urgent hour!”

Daylight Saving Time ends tonight, so if you are affected by the time change, turn your clocks back one hour. By way of encouragement, I pass on this news:

Pedestrians walking during the evening rush hour are nearly three times more likely to be struck and killed by cars than before the time change, two scientists calculate. Ending daylight saving time translates into about 37 more U.S. pedestrian deaths around 6 p.m. in November compared to October, the researchers report.

Have a good weekend.

Just a couple links tonight, I’m afraid.

First of all, Phil drew my attention to this piece from the Tominthebox website. I’ve never seen this site before, but it seems to specialize in the kind of sophisticated, subtle satire that I confuse so many people with myself, in some of my columns at The American Spectator Online.

Luther’s body found lying on its face? It could happen.

Dave Lull sent me a link to this piece from Pajamas Media, about Hege Storhaug, a brave Norwegian woman who’s challenging the multiculturalist blitzkrieg.

There are, in fact, a few brave, freedom-loving Norwegians left. I’m in the process of interviewing another myself, and the results should be visible eventually at the Spectator site. I’ll tell you more when I know more.

Have a great weekend!

I’ve had better days than today.

I took a half vacation day, because I’d made an appointment with a plumber to look at a water pressure problem in my shower. His diagnosis was that I need my entire pipe system rebuilt.

That wasn’t the answer I was looking for. I’ll put that one off. For years, God willing.

As I left work to meet the plumber, I exchanged a few words with a co-worker. As he turned away from me to go inside, he walked straight into a column in the entryway and gave himself a bloody nose.

I know in my heart it was my fault.

I also noticed a couple deaths in the news. One was Robert Goulet. Goulet has become a sort of a joke in recent decades, but when I was a kid I thought he was the coolest guy in the world. I wanted to grow up to look like him and sing like him. I also wanted to be married to Carol Lawrence, his wife at the time. (They were slim, dark-haired people. When I was a kid I never understood all the excitement about blondes. I lived in one of the most Norwegian towns in America. Blondes were a dime a dozen in Kenyon. Dark-haired people were exotic and beautiful in my eyes.)

I did not succeed in growing up to be Goulet, but I’ve learned to live with it.

Also Hank Reinhardt died Tuesday. You’ve probably never heard of him, but he was the founder of Museum Replicas, Ltd., one of the foremost purveyors of replica swords to reenactors like me. I have several pieces of equipment from his company. He was also, as it happened, married to a senior editor at Baen Books, who is now Managing Editor, so I had one degree of separation from his acquaintance.



But there is one piece of good news. Fred Phelps’ Westboro Baptist Church, the egregious “God Hates Fags” people, lost a big case in federal court (thanks to Blue Crab Boulevard). They’ll have to pay the family of an Iraq War veteran whose funeral they disrupted.

I can imagine ways in which this judgment might lead to bad precedents, but if anybody has it coming it’s the WBC crowd.

God hates ‘em.

Mitt Romney in an interview with Sean Hannity tonight:

But I fundamentally think the people will not vote based upon someone’s gender or their race, or their religion, for that matter. I think they’re going to look at what their vision is for the future of the country, where they would take it, and whether they had the experience and skills to actually lead a nation of our scale in such a critical time.

And I think the greatest drawback beyond the direction [Mrs. Clinton would] take us is that she’s never run anything. She’s never had the occasion of being in the private sector, running a business, or, for that matter, running a state or a city. She hasn’t run anything, and the government of the United States is not a place for a president to be an intern. You need to have experience actually leading and running things.

I’m late, and this post will be short, assuming I get it posted at all.

I’ve been in Wireless Router Purgatory all evening, and Earthlink phone support is down due to “technical problems” (no doubt they’re on hold with their own phone support). Then, after a couple hours, my connection light came on again all on its own. And then off again. And now it’s on again. So I’m hoping I can get this posted before it falls off the wagon once more.

Blue Crab Boulevard provides this post about the world’s oldest clam–we’re talking a 400-year-old mollusk here. Found in one of my favorite places, no less. Iceland.

What the article doesn’t tell is whether it was found in a month with an “R” in it.

And Theodore Dalrymple (himself not a believer) makes some excellent arguments against recent atheist books in City Journal. (Hat tip to Freedom Dogs.)

Earlier this month, Rami Khader Ayyad, 32, was abducted and murdered in Gaza City. He ran The Teacher’s Bookshop, the only Christian bookstore in Gaza and part of ministry of the Holy Bible Society. May the Lord deliver the Palestinian people from the hands of murderers.

I’m conflicted about Halloween, probably because I often think of it in these adult terms, but this Japanese skirt looks like a great costume. Of course, some people may ask for candy from you instead of the other way round, but maybe they will offer money in exchange.